Congress: House to vote on extending debt ceiling

“House Republicans are scheduled to vote Wednesday to extend the nation's $16.4 trillion debt limit as the opening salvo in a renewed battle this year to pass a federal budget and reduce the debt,” USA Today writes. “The GOP bill would suspend the limit on the nation's borrowing authority to pay for the nation's legal obligations through May 18.”

And, mark your calendars: “President Obama and House Budget Chairman Paul Ryan, R-Wis., will release their respective budgets after the president's Feb. 12 State of the Union Address.” And: “In an effort to pressure the Senate, House Republicans included in their legislation a provision to suspend lawmakers' salaries if their respective chamber does not pass a budget by April 15.”

Politico on the GOP’s “debt-ceiling makeover”: “The warning was unusually dire. Speaker John Boehner laid out what many in Washington already knew as he stood before House Republicans at his party’s retreat last week: The GOP needed a new plan to tackle the debt ceiling. Trying to force President Barack Obama to slash trillions of dollars in spending against the backdrop of default simply wouldn’t work this time around.” Boehner made the pitch and Paul Ryan was the “salesman.”

NBC’s Tom Curry: “With inaugural festivities over, President Barack Obama and members of Congress have returned to budget trench warfare. House Republicans will vote Wednesday on suspending the federal government’s debt limit until May 19 in the latest chapter of this ongoing saga that has consumed Washington for the better part of the last two years. GOP leaders hope that by passing their bill, they will not only postpone another debt limit confrontation with Obama, but will put the onus on the Democratic-controlled Senate to pass a budget resolution which would set spending levels for federal programs for the coming fiscal year. The Senate hasn't passed a budget resolution since 2009.”

“Senate Democrats Tuesday promised quick action on President Obama’s agenda to curb gun violence by placing all of Obama’s proposals in one sweeping bill,” the New York Daily News writes. “Until this week, Democrats had considered moving the gun-control proposals in separate bills. Consolidating the proposals could streamline the process, allowing quick passage of some elements even if more controversial proposals, such as a ban on assault weapons, are stripped out of the package.”

“For years, conservatives have called President Barack Obama a leftist radical hiding behind a moderate facade. If the country had only listened, the argument went, voters never would have elected him in the first place,” Politico writes. “Now they’re saying, we told you so.”

Mitch McConnell, famous for quotes about President Obama: “One thing that was pretty clear from the president’s speech yesterday, the era of liberalism is back.”